“Where do we go?” asks Saraswati Naiya, who has spent the last 35 years selling fritters from a small stall on Jadavpur’s railway platform for 35 years. She stares at the empty space where around 40 “illegal” establishments once stood before they were demolished on June 7. More than 300 other makeshift businesses still exist on the station’s premises, and among their owners, the same question hangs in the air.
“I don’t know what I will do if the shop gets uprooted. No one will give me a job in this state. Feeding people is what I’ve done all my life. What do I do now?” asks Saraswati, who is disabled and the shop her only source of livelihood. She says she has heard nothing from the government about their plans of rehabilitation.
